Review: Taproot by Keezy Young

Blue is having a hard time moving on. He's in love with his best friend. He's also dead. Luckily, Hamal can see ghosts, leaving Blue free to haunt him to his heart's content. But something eerie is happening in town, leaving the local afterlife unsettled, and when Blue realizes Hamal's strange ability may be putting him in danger, Blue has to find a way to protect him, even if it means... leaving him. 

-- Goodreads.com description --












I received Taproot from Netgalley and the publishers in exchange for an honest review.
Taproot is a graphic novel about Hamal who can see ghosts. You follow Hamal's adventures with Blue and their budding relationship. 

Things I liked:

- I really liked the art style and the colours that were used. The ghosts are blue/greyish, including their speech bubbles!

- I really enjoyed Hamal's and Blue's relationship! I love the diversity in this book.

I loved the humour in this book, especially the grim reaper got some great lines!

Things I didn't like:

I enjoyed Taproot, although I wish it had been longer. Once I got fully invested in the story, I had already reached the end.

I would have liked a little more worldbuilding and character development, but maybe that's just the genre (which I'm not that familiar with).

In addition, there were a lot of characters (especially the others ghosts) of which the reader knows almost nothing about all. I feel this is a bit of missed opportunity. Either you include them and introduce them properly to the reader or you leave them out entirely. 

I felt we only got to know the characters superficially and I wish they had a bit more depth. This could perhaps have been solved if the graphic novel had been longer.

All in all, I thought this was a fantastic introduction to Keezy Young's work. I really like her art style and I could definitely be persuaded to read more of her work in the future. I gave Taproot 3 stars! I do believe younger readers might enjoy this more even more than I did.